The present invention relates to an automatic document conveyance apparatus used for conveying a document to a reading position for reading the document, and particularly to an automatic document conveyance apparatus by which the document can be conveyed such that obverse and reverse sides of the document are reversed, in order to read images on the obverse and reverse sides of the document. The automatic document conveyance apparatus according to the present invention is used for a copier, a facsimile device, and the like.
Preferred characteristics for the above-described automatic document conveyance apparatus are a small size, efficient reversing and conveying capabilities, and so on. As an automatic document conveyance apparatus to satisfy such requirements, for example, there is an apparatus disclosed in Japanese Tokkaihei No. 7-175279.
The automatic document conveyance apparatus disclosed in Japanese Tokkaihei No. 7-175279 has a reversal conveyance path to reverse both sides of the document, and after the document is conveyed such that its first side is read, the document is conveyed to the reversal conveyance path, and is reversed on the reversal conveyance path, and conveyed again to the reading position. The document whose second side has been read, is further reversed to align the page order at the delivery.
As described above, in the automatic document conveyance apparatus disclosed in the above patent publication, it is required that the document passes through the conveyance path 3 times in total in order to achieve reading of both sides thereof. Accordingly, in the conventional automatic document conveyance apparatus disclosed in the above patent publication, efficiency of the reading operation at the time of reading the both sides is not good, and high speed reading can not be performed, which is a problem.